Update: - It's become clear that Comcast wants to charge Level 3 for customer requests for video (et. al.) that are not based on their XFinity system - so if a Comcast customer uses NetFlix, or streams from iTunes (etc), then Comcast wants to toss a tollbooth on that content. This is understandable, even if it is incredibly stupid.

Let's say that Level 3 told Comcast to go fish, and Comcast then broke all non-XFinity services on their network. Exactly who do they think would take the PR hit for the services that their customers pay for and wouldn't be able to receive? Here's a hint - none of their customers have even heard of Level 3, and Level 3 isn't the one with the phone lines that would start lighting up when this happened...

You probably noticed the lack of posting since early this morning - I've been busy teaching an Intro to VisualWorks class via webcast. I'll be doing it all week, so posting is going to be intermittant the whole week.

It's actually working better than I expected - we're using Adobe Connect Pro to deliver the live presentation/demo to people - I have a second monitor up so that I can broadcast the demo screen, and keep the meeting chat room up on the second screen. The quality has been pretty good, and we've been using skype for two way conversations as needed (we haven't been able to get that to work in the Adobe tool).

The screen sharing has worked quite well - while it's not as good as being there, it's pretty good. I think this is the future of training that I'm seeing this week :)

I've seen this complaint about running Smalltalk app servers before, and I'm sure I'll see it again:

Running headless is a bear. Updating (e.g., loading the latest version of the web server or fixing a security vulnerability) a headless image on a remote server is very difficult (one has to either have a VNC session running in the image or save the image, copy it to a local machine, update it, copy it back, start it up again.)

Well.... not so much. I run a headless server here, and it's pretty easy - I have an image that loads what it needs when it starts up, and I can kill and restart anytime I want. For patching, I simply have a patch directory, and an interface that lets me "poke" the system and load whatever it finds in the patch directory. Since it will only load from there, and only when I tell it too (i.e., there's no code being loaded from an input field), it's secure enough for what I do.

I could automate that more if I felt like it; having a process periodically scan the patch dir, load whatever is there and then delete it would remove a manual step, for instance. The larger point is, patching a running server is easy, and it's one of the truly cool things about running a Smalltalk server.

Those patches vn be very invasive as well - some of the patches I loaded in the past (on the blog I ran at Cincom, which is an ancestor of this one) changed the shape of objects in the image on the fly.

So no, you don't need VNC, or a headful image. All you need is a little planning :)

Today's Smalltalk 4 You continues with "ProfStef", which is part of the "one click" Pharo download. Today we we get started with message sending syntax - specifically, unary messages (message sends with no arguments). If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, use the viewer below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

The copyright kings don't want you to know just how bogus their claims are - a lawyer who sells a $20 package of "FYI" documents, telling you how to defend against one of the fishing expeditions, is now being sued:

On November 22, Syfert received another email from attorney Jeff Weaver informing him that he had made a formal request for sanctions against him on behalf of the production company behind The Hurt Locker, one of the driving forces behind the USCG lawsuits. Weaver is apparently claiming that the 19 cases filed using the self-help package have cost his firm $5000 and he wants Syfert to pay.

How dare people find an inexensive way to deal with a bunch of overpaid lawyers with way too much time on their hands...

We finally got back to board gaming last night - my friend Mike got me the game "Founding Fathers", and we sat down to a game - my brother in law was visiting, so it's nice that it handles 5 players. The game has you at the (US) Constitutional Convention, voting on the various articles for the document - and you end up working with the four main factions - big states, small states, federalists, anti-federalists. It's all pretty fluid, and your options change as you get your hand replenished with new delegates.

It played pretty well, and, once we got going, it was a simple game. The rules only look long because they include bios of all the convention attendees :) If you like strategy games that take 90-120 minutes to play, this one is pretty cool.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes (or any other podcatching software) using this feed directly or in iTunes with this one.

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the AAC edition. The AAC edition comes with chapter markers. You can subscribe to either edition of the podcast directly in iTunes; just search for Smalltalk and look in the Podcast results. You can subscribe to the mp3 edition directly using this feed, or the AAC edition using this feed using any podcatching software. You can also download the podcast in ogg format.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes (or any other podcatching software) using this feed directly or in iTunes with this one.

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the AAC edition. The AAC edition comes with chapter markers. You can subscribe to either edition of the podcast directly in iTunes; just search for Smalltalk and look in the Podcast results. You can subscribe to the mp3 edition directly using this feed, or the AAC edition using this feed using any podcatching software. You can also download the podcast in ogg format.

As I said earlier, the slow learners over at DHS apparently aren't aware that they don't have jurisdiction over the entire internet. Market Ticker is quoted by TechCrunch:

That’s a lot of staff attorney time and trouble to get a big fat nothing out of it, which is exactly what they get going down this road. Why? Because all they can do is redirect the domain pointers which will do exactly nothing when the sites re-register under a top-level domain not under the US Government’s jurisdiction and there are lots of them.

Now we just have to wait for the coming justification for the "Great Firewall of the DHS". I'm sure that it will be "for the children"

Lukas has another highly descriptive post up on using his PetitParser:

In a previous post I described the basic principles of PetitParser and gave some introductory examples. In this blog post I am going to present a way to define more complicated grammars. We continue where we left off the last time, with the expression grammar.

Update 4:Now there's confirmation - it looks like it is a government operation, with Immix doing the work. I'll return to my original question: how the heck is this the business of DHS?

“ICE office of Homeland Security Investigations executed court-ordered seizure warrants against a number of domain names,” said Cori W. Bassett, a spokeswoman for ICE, in a statement. “As this is an ongoing investigation, there are no additional details available at this time.”

Update 3: This may be the missing piece of the puzzle. Go back to this story from May 18, where we find out what Immix is up to:

So.... it looks like it's a federally backed operation, but run by the "cyber security" people at Immix Group. The only question is, how high up in DHS/ICE did the OK for this go? Did they have a bunch of pre-ok'd warrants about that they acted on, or did some kind of legal action take place late Friday? At this point, I'd like to see some real reporting done on this.

Update 2: - A look at the registrar information turns up a immixGroup IT Solutions - and it looks like they do a lot of work for the government. So.... is this some kind of pseudo government operation that jumped the gun? That would explain the ability to get the DNS redirected (the sites in question are being redirected via seizedservers.com DNS services), while also explaining the lack of any PR push. If you go to the whois lookup for seizedservers, you can get all of that info. Curiouser and curiouser...

Update: Ok, this now looks more interesting. Have a look at the source of one of the sites that's been taken down, like torrent-finder.com. The source doesn't have any of the "official government" stuff you would expect - and there's a script being loaded from 74.81.170.107 - which is located in North Carolina, and doesn't look at all like a government run operation. Or, if it is government, it's some kind of second hand contract sort of thing that could be denied. Since I'm not really in the conspiracy business, let's take the more obvious tack: it's likely that the RIAA or the MPAA (or possibly both) are paying someone else to do the dirty work that they couldn't get the government to do for them through the proposed COICA law. Or heck, it could be a set of pranksters out having a good time - right now, there's no telling. I think Drudge needs to dig a little deeper on this one.

Another thing - there are no press releases out from DHS or ICE. Typically, when a government agency does something like this, they announce it with great fanfare as an example of "protecting the country". Since there's none of that here, it makes me really wonder.

Hat tip to Michael, for prodding me on this and doing a bunch of the research.

The investigative arm of the Homeland Security Department appears to be shutting down websites that facilitate copyright infringement.

So what happens when the slower class at DHS figures out that domains can be set up beyond their jurisdiction? Does the US build its own version of the "Great Firewall of China", with the DHS acting as the muscle for the RIAA and MPAA?

It doesn't seem to matter who's in the Oval Office or the Congress; on copyright matters, the stupid never stops. Oh, and if you don't think this kind of siezure isn't open to easy abuse - you're not thinking hard enough. Just imagine that (insert partisan forces you distrust here) is in power, and apply the rhetoric you usually use on other issues...

A question came up on the VWNC list recently about teaching some simple physics modeling. Of course there's always EToys to look at as an example, but something else came to mind: ElastoLab, from Dave Buck:

ElastoLab is a fun program for kids that lets them play with sound, images and motion in a simulated physics environment. ElastoLab

It's a really cool simulator that lets you play with all sorts of variations on motion.

I guess I have to rethink the idea that most spy stories are yarns too unbelievable to be true. I just finished reading "Operation Mincemeat
", and trust me - this story definitely needs to be filed under "truth is stranger than fiction".

It's not just that the deception operation - using a dead man with false papers to convince the Nazis that Greece and Sardinia were being invaded rather than Sicily - was fantastic. No, it's the various weird things that happened along the way, and the fact that the entire Nazi hierarchy bought the deception, even given all of the holes in it.

The book is a great read - like a spy thriller, but with the added benefit of being real history. While Ian Fleming has a bit part in the tale (in case you ever wondered where his ideas came from), the real stars were Ewen Montagu and Charles Cholmondeley, along with the supporting cast of intelligence operatives around them. I won't spoil the story by telling you much more about it - just go grab the book and read it. You'll be glad you did.

I installed Office for Mac today - my dad bought a family pack and had a spare use license available. So I figured what the heck - I have to deal with Office documents all the time, and while iWork does a decent job with them, it doesn't handle everything I get. This popped up while I was installing, and I have no idea why:

Why does the Office installer care that Chrome is running?

Update - it gets stranger. If I start Chrome after I have one of the Office apps running, it won't load pages. I get the message about a script hanging the page from Chrome, but for any page. If Chrome is running when I start an Office app, this doesn't happen. So... what the heck did Microsoft screw up such that they have a runtime issue with a browser?

Update 2 - Ok, now I can't replicate that behavior, but it did happen more than once. Really, really strange...

Seemingly overnight, a undead plague ravages the once bountiful frontier, decimating the landscape and reawakening the dead. In towns, settlements, and outposts throughout the world, the uninfected citizens are left to fight for survival against waves of the undead. John Marston must ride out into the vast and terrifying world and survive long enough to find a cure.

This sounds like a fusion of the game and the TV show "The Walking Dead". It might be fun to play - but boy, it just doesn't seem to fit in at all with the basic premise of the game. Not to mention this: by the end of Redemption, Marsters is ded anyway. So is this more or less an alternate history that pops up when he was about to be whacked at the end?

There's a charge for the speakers, which is not exactly the norm for tech conferences. Now that I'm "on the outside", I have to say - it's a bit of a hurdle. I'd need to take a week off (and not get paid during that week, mind you) just to go, so additional fees are a problem

No word on how to register. Presumably that's coming soon, but you would have thought that a registration page would have been available with the announcement...

Today's Smalltalk 4 You continues with "ProfStef", which is part of the "one click" Pharo download. Today we look at creating Array objects using literal syntax. One caveat - this method is not consistent (or even available) across all Smalltalk dialects. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, use the viewer below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

I have to say, I'm not impressed with the new Airprint feature. My wife was looking forward to being able to print from her iPad - we have a 2 year old WiFi enabled printer (HP), so we thought it looked positive. Well... not so much. Get a load out of the tiny list of printers that are supported:

There's a PrinterShare app for the iPad and iPhone that works with the Wifi enabled printer - you would think that Apple would have figured that out as well. Nope - looks like the only people who can use Airprint are the ones who just bought a printer, and happened to buy the right one.

Today, Google is launching a new plugin for Microsoft Office called Cloud Connect, which will tie Google Docs directly into the ubiquitous productivity suite, free of charge. Editing a document in Word? It’ll automatically sync to your Google Docs account each time you hit ‘Save’. Want to share a preview of your document without worrying about what file format your coworkers can open? Just send them a link to the Google Docs file. The plugin supports Microsoft Word, PowerPoint, and Excel, and it’s a big deal for Google’s strategy with Docs.

You have to wonder how Microsoft feels about that. On the one hand, it does plug into their tools; on the other hand, it gives a nice glide ramp off those tools and over to the Google suite - which is free for the small/home end, and very inexpensive for the enterprise side. If nothing else, the price points MS charges for Office should start coming under real pressure...

I anticipate I’ll take about 5 percent of my pictures with it in the coming year. The other 95 percent will be taken with my iPhone. How do I know? Because I had the S90 last year and that was my exact usage pattern.

That's what I've noticed as well - I take the vast majority of my photos with the iPhone. Why?

Smartphones are always connected. Point & shoots never are. When I take a cool picture, I often want to share it right away. With my smartphone, it takes 20 seconds. With my point & shoot, it’s impossible. I have to wait until I get home, upload it to my computer, then upload it to the web.

That's pretty much it right there. With my phone, the photos can be shared immediately; with my regular camera, there's a delay (and truth be told, I might not even get around to it). Professionals and serious hobbyists will keep buying nice cameras, of course, but that entire space is going to drop into niche status, as most of us just use our smartphones. Ironically, that probably means that prices on nice digital cameras will go up, because the buying audience will shrink - unless they start doing 3g deals with wireless vendors. Even that might not work though - why would I want to carry two devices when I can get by with one?

At this point it might be simpler to list the handful of network content that you can get via GoogleTV:

Are we beginning to see a pattern yet? Just when we thought (or at least we were hoping) that Fox was going to be the last major network to block Google TV, Viacom has arrived just in time to rain on our parade. That’s right folks, Viacom is now blocking Google TV devices from streaming full episodes across their entire line of properties.